New York City’s Community Board voted last night to tear down a building located just 600 feet from Ground Zero and replace it with a 13-story mosque and “cultural” center. The vote was 29-1 for the mosque, even as New Yorkers showed up to loudly voice their opposition. If built, the mosque will replace a 152-year-old building damaged by debris from the fallen World Trade Center buildings. The final decision will be made when the Landmark Preservation Commission meets to decide whether the building is indeed a “landmark.”

The meeting was emotional. Some New Yorkers brought signs with photos of their loved ones who died when the buildings went down. Nevertheless, Mayor Bloomberg has supported the mosque and he appoints the members of the Landmark Preservation Board.

The leadership of Stop Islamization of America — Pamela Geller and I [Robert Spencer] — was there as well. Hindu activists were there. Jewish activists were there. Christian activists were there. An ex-Muslim spoke via a cellphone held up to the microphone. It was a wonderful display of the unity among those threatened by jihad and Islamic supremacism that I’ve been calling for for years.

The atmosphere was rowdy, with tempers running high. The mosque proponents and the politicians were primarily responsible for this, as they immediately began to brand the opponents of the mosque initiative as racists and bigots. The local city councilwoman, whose name I believe was Chan, characterized all opposition to the mosque as hatred and bigotry, and said that to support the mosque was simply a matter of tolerance and pluralism. Mosque proponents distributed a written statement from Stringer, favoring the mosque and saying: “I for one never want to see our country or our city abandon religious tolerance as the result of an act of violence, even one as unspeakable as the 9/11 attacks.”

This kind of talk angered the mosque opponents in the crowd, and there were many. There was a great deal of catcalling and booing of the multiculturalist platitudes and self-righteous moralizing, and the schoolmarmish chairperson of the Community Board repeatedly warned catcallers in the crowd that they would be held “out of order” — but their threats were as toothless and empty as their moralizing, and the indignation of the crowd would break out repeatedly throughout the evening whenever another bemused liberal or smooth-talking Muslim would excoriate “hatred” and “bigotry” and extol “tolerance.” Daisy Khan showed a brief Power Point presentation that said, among other things, that the Islamic Center would help non-Muslims to integrate.

Interesting word choice. Not help Muslims to integrate into the American secular fabric, but to help non-Muslims to integrate. Into…a Sharia state? Is that the goal?…

But that doesn’t mean that the 9/11 Mosque is a fait accompli. Oh, no. The people in that room tonight who knew that they were being lied to and sold a bill of goods are not going to take this lying down. This is why it is all the more crucial for you, if you possibly can, to attend our June 6 rally at noon at Zucotti Park in lower Manhattan. This is our last chance to make our voices heard. And we will be heard.

Read more, see more at Pam Geller’s Atlas Shrugs. The innovative Geller snagged a spot to speak early by saying her topic was “outreach,” so she was put at the microphone among the first speakers, because they thought she was pro-mosque.

The video below is from No Mosques at Ground Zero, which has a wealth of info on what is really going on behind the efforts to help this mosque turn into a reality (video audio is poor but you’ll get the idea). Also see a video of Debra Burlingame, the sister of one of the pilots killed in the attack on the World Trade Towers.

The second video, courtesy of Bare Naked Islam, is a commonsense argument for not building the mosque, and asks “what’s next?”

A couple of weeks ago the guys from South Park wanted to make a cartoon drawing of Mohammed and the frigging country came to a standstill…but a mosque at Ground Zero – that’s no problem…

Pam Geller at NYC Community Board (video)

A mosque at Ground Zero…what’s next?

HillBuzz suggests if this mega-mosque is built, it could turn the entire state of New York into Republicans.